Apple employees taken by surprise at sudden departure.

The sudden departure of iOS Software head Scott Forstall—along with Apple's retail head John Browett—sent shockwaves through the Apple community late Monday. But it wasn't just us outsiders who were surprised by the news—engineers within Apple were also reportedly surprised by the apparent firing of such an important figure. While Apple is keeping its lips sealed over exactly what happened, details have begun to leak out about why Forstall was shown the door, painting a picture of strife among Apple's top executives.

The first is a Wall Street Journal report claiming Forstall was asked to leave because he refused to sign Apple's public apology letter for iOS 6 Maps in September. Forstall reportedly felt an apology wasn't necessary and chose not to participate in the decision to acknowledge Maps' problems to the public, leaving Apple CEO Tim Cook to sign his own name to the letter. Forstall, known by many to have a "strong-headed" personality, also reportedly told people that there was no "decider" within Apple after Steve Jobs' death. Sources claim he sent an e-mail to the iOS team in order to chide them for not coming up with big enough ideas.

Other reports touch on "tensions" between Forstall and other Apple executives. The New York Times mentioned that Forstall had been clashing with other executives "for some time" before the Maps apology letter—specifically, he had clashed heavily with Apple's head designer Jonathan Ive. "[T]he relationship between Mr. Forstall and Mr. Ive had soured to a point that the two executives would not sit in the same meeting room together," the Times wrote.

This report was echoed by CNN's Fortune: "It is being said that Forstall didn't get along with Jony Ive. The knighted designer won that battle." As pointed out by John Gruber, this was foreshadowed by an interview with Ive earlier this year, wherein Ive "winced" when asked about the stitched leather interface on some iOS and OS X applications. At the time, Ive gave a statement saying, "In terms of those elements you're talking about, I'm not really connected to that."

But Forstall's clashes went beyond Ive, too. "A senior Apple employee who asked not to be named said Mr. Forstall had also incurred the ire of other executives after inserting himself into product development that went beyond his role at the company," the Times said. "One person in touch with Apple executives said the mood of people at the company was largely positive about Mr. Forstall’s departure."

This is a sentiment echoed by our own sources, who had unpublishable things to say about Forstall—they generally seemed relieved at the news. The same with GigaOm: "Forstall’s firing was met with a sense of quiet jubilation, especially among people who worked in the engineering groups. Or as one of my sources quipped: there are a lot of people going for celebratory drinks, even if there is a little bit of doubt about their roles in the future."

GigaOm offers a few more details as well, including the fact that engineering teams seemed to be "caught off guard" by the Forstall announcement. This is in contrast with engineering head Bob Mansfield's retirement in June (which has since been tweaked slightly to allow him to stay on board)—Mansfield's resignation was reportedly "masterfully planned," while Forstall's departure was swiftly executed.

As for Browett, his not-even-a-year stint at Apple has come to a less surprising end. We'll have more on what went wrong with Browett, but the general public reaction to his firing has been more muted.

Jacqui Cheng
Jacqui is an Editor at Large at Ars Technica, where she has spent the last eight years writing about Apple culture, gadgets, social networking, privacy, and more. Emailjacqui@arstechnica.com//Twitter@eJacqui

128 Reader Comments

Quite interesting and shocking at the same time. Scott must have enjoyed the privileges bestowed upon him by Steve because he has been there with him for so long throughout bad and good times. Wonder what he will do now? Maybe MeeGo? WebOS? Something truly open source I hope, not any corporate agenda like Google's datamining OS.

Wasn't there similar quiet jubilation at Apple when Jobs left in 1985? Not that Forstall is as vital as SJ was to Apple's success, but the 'mad genius' types tend to have strong personalities, to put it mildly.

Edit: And not that Forstall is necessarily a 'mad genius', it's just a mistake to equate a dismissal like this with incompetence or professional inadequecy (except for the 'working with others' bit).

A shakeup like this was probably long overdue. Any new CEO needs to make their mark, and it's clear that Tim Cook wants to be a bit more honest about Apple short-comings than his predecessor. Scott just didn't have what it takes to adapt.

Quite interesting and shocking at the same time. Scott must have enjoyed the privileges bestowed upon him by Steve because he has been there with him for so long throughout bad and good times. Wonder what he will do now? Maybe MeeGo? WebOS? Something truly open source I hope, not any corporate agenda like Google's datamining OS.

I bet he goes to Yahoo and joins the other industry execs who have nowhere else to go.

What went wrong with Browett? Probably the fact that he was hired in the first place. His appointment was a puzzling decision for many, judging by the culture clash of the stores he'd overseen with those of Apple. He can now go sell his "high-margin" accessories somewhere else, as far as I'm concerned.

No one will shed any tears for Browett, but you could argue his was a poor appointment by Cook. His reputation in the UK was already rock-bottom before he was given the job at Apple.

As for Forstall, well time will tell. But if he was responsible for Siri being an under-performer, Maps being a terrible PR event and arguably poor at launch, as well as some of the app-design peculiarities, then perhaps its for the better. I am sure he's delighted though that he's following in Steve's footsteps (by getting fired). It's so obvious how much he wants to be the next Steve Jobs.

Wasn't there similar quiet jubilation at Apple when Jobs left in 1985? Not that Forstall is as vital as SJ was to Apple's success, but the 'mad genius' types tend to have strong personalities, to put it mildly.

I have no idea if he's as valuable as Steve Jobs, but the reality is that companies usually need a**holes with great vision to produce great products. Those are the guys that won't back down when it comes to what they think is best for the product, and will work teams long hours over minor details to get it right. Those guys are very valuable, but will never be loved.

The mark of a great leader is being able to have that vision and inspire teams to that level of performance WITHOUT being an a**hole. Those guys are even rarer.

*No idea if Forstall was any of those things, because it's tough to get a balanced picture of a guy from the people that he had to annoy on a regular basis.

I guess Forestall found out that there is a "decider" after all. Maybe this means the end of all those tacky faux leather skins that come on the Contacts and Calendar apps? I'll drink to that! I've always thought there was something creepy and monomaniacal about Forestall's grin, even more so after his cosmetic dentistry binge.

Wasn't there similar quiet jubilation at Apple when Jobs left in 1985? Not that Forstall is as vital as SJ was to Apple's success, but the 'mad genius' types tend to have strong personalities, to put it mildly.

I have no idea if he's as valuable as Steve Jobs, but the reality is that companies usually need a**holes with great vision to produce great products. Those are the guys that won't back down when it comes to what they think is best for the product, and will work teams long hours over minor details to get it right. Those guys are very valuable, but will never be loved.

The mark of a great leader is being able to have that vision and inspire teams to that level of performance WITHOUT being an a**hole. Those guys are even rarer.

*No idea if Forstall was any of those things, because it's tough to get a balanced picture of a guy from the people that he had to annoy on a regular basis.

He can now go sell his "high-margin" accessories somewhere else, as far as I'm concerned.

I thought Apple was the master of "high-margin" accessories? They sell a $20 Lightning-USB cable and a $30 Lightning-30pin adapter after all.

Difference is, you'll probably *need* those, regardless of price. Under Browett, if he followed his usual course, You would likely have been sold a lot of cruft you simply didn't have a practical use for. It was par for the course at Curry's/PC World, where he departed to go to apple.

All I can say is that if Apple's first party apps lose the cheesy fake leather and fake stitching and fake paper design sensibility, it will be a very happy day. There's a reason fake wood paneling died out on cars.

Wasn't there similar quiet jubilation at Apple when Jobs left in 1985? Not that Forstall is as vital as SJ was to Apple's success, but the 'mad genius' types tend to have strong personalities, to put it mildly.

I have no idea if he's as valuable as Steve Jobs, but the reality is that companies usually need a**holes with great vision to produce great products. Those are the guys that won't back down when it comes to what they think is best for the product, and will work teams long hours over minor details to get it right. Those guys are very valuable, but will never be loved.

The mark of a great leader is being able to have that vision and inspire teams to that level of performance WITHOUT being an a**hole. Those guys are even rarer.

*No idea if Forstall was any of those things, because it's tough to get a balanced picture of a guy from the people that he had to annoy on a regular basis.

I'm not really convinced that Forestall had any real vision. There may have been some synergy between him and jobs that brought out the best in him, but iOS hasn't advanced at the pace it needs to in order to stay ahead of Windows Phone or Android, IMO.

I never liked him during the keynotes, and I never followed the stories of him being a Jobs wannabe, but it seems at least on the public face, that he might not be the best person for the job Jobs' absence.

I really hope this will drive apple to make some dramatic changes to iOS UI! it sorely needs it! Also now that iOS and OS X are coming under one man, i hope there will be more openness in terms of app support in the OS, meaning apps will have greater freedom to interact with each other and share data. This will help open up a whole set of powerful and feature rich apps. Imagine any app able to use siri or every social app able to tap in the sharing options? That would be greeat!

Wasn't there similar quiet jubilation at Apple when Jobs left in 1985?

When SJ left it was because he had been relieved of any and all responsibility, but was still actually employed. He left - of his own accord - in disgust, and it was a good thing - he was a loose cannon and was incredibly disruptive.

SF, on the other hand, was in charge of one of the largest (and key) divisions at Apple. It's going to be very interesting to see what happens from this point on. For one, I'd like to know just how much of Maps' shipping problems were down to him, and (guessing here) how much was down to other people telling him to 'just ship it'.

it is rumored that Scott used the phrase ' Steve wouldn't have allowed this' bit more than a lot.

..... which is really interesting because if Forstall is right about those observations, then other execs are likely to get pissed off at hearing someone-that-is-not-Steve-Jobs tell them they're doing their job wrong. So yeah, he's going to get shown the door. Not because he's right or wrong, but because he is making his case in completely the wrong way.

That said, I do think this siutation really highlights the longstanding division between the Jobs/Forstall line of thinking and the Cook/Schiller/Ive line of thinking when it comes to UI and design. Jobs was always a big promoter of texture and context in the UI and the product (the early iMacs, Aqua, pinstripes, wood paneling, over-styled iTunes icons, etc.), whereas Ive was more into understated designs like the iBook G4 and the iPhone.

This tension has been going on at Apple for 14 years and now, it's over. Don't be surprised if the (e.g.) "reel-to-reel" interface elements in the iOS 6 Podcasts app goes away.

I think Forstall's biggest folly in the executive world of Apple, from what I've read previously and today, is that he simply always shook the blame for something off on someone else.

Other articles have noted that he would take praise for collaborative efforts and push the blame for any problems off on someone else. Working with others is only as good as sharing the consequences of those actions.

Not signing the maps apology seems to fit in with that theory as well.